In recent years, reliance upon wind as a source of energy has grown. As reliance upon wind as a source of energy continues to grows, increased efficiency of wind turbines and wind turbine farms increases in importance.
Generally, a wind turbine converts wind energy into rotational energy, and more specifically, converts kinetic energy of wind into mechanical energy. The mechanical energy is used for producing electrical power. Wind turbines may include a rotor having multiple blades that rotate in response to force provided by the wind. Upon rotating the multiple blades, a drive shaft rotates, which in turn drives an electrical generator to generate the electrical power.
A wind farm is a group of interconnected wind turbines at a location. The location of the wind farm may consist of two wind turbines to hundreds of wind turbines. The location of the wind farm may cover a small area of hundreds of square yards (square meters) to an extended area of hundreds of square miles (square kilometers). The location of the wind farm may be located off-shore or near-shore, typically selected so as to increase the energy of the wind. The location may be selected to increase the energy generated by the wind.
Wind turbines and wind farms can be monitored by a computer system, for example, a Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition system (“SCADA” system). The SCADA system can monitor and control a plant or equipment in industries such as telecommunications, water and waste control, energy, oil and gas refining, transportation. The SCADA system can gather information, such as where a leak on a pipeline has occurred, transfer the information back to a central site, alert a home station that the leak has occurred, carry out necessary analysis and control, such as determining if the leak is critical, and display the information in a logical and organized manner. The SCADA system can be simple, such as a system that monitors environmental conditions of a small office building, or complex, such as a system that monitors all activity in a nuclear power plant or a municipal water system.
As wind turbines and wind farms become more interconnected, larger, and/or more remote, providing performance-related information to an operator about one or more wind turbines or wind farms becomes more important. If the operator receives too little information, then the operator will not be aware of performance-related issues. If the operator receives too much information, then the operator will not be capable of adequately responding to performance-related issues. If the operator receives the information too late, then a trip event will likely occur. Addressing the performance-related issue prior to a trip event can increase overall efficiency of a wind turbine or wind turbine farm. Failure to monitor and control the wind turbines or wind farms can result in decreased efficiency or failure of the wind turbine or wind farm.